Gas Prices Keep Tumbling Down

Gas may be down more than $2 since its June peak, but no one's shouting hallelujah just yet.

"Great, I can almost afford to drive," said senior Delores D. Bush of Bremerton on Monday as she walked into Garguile's Red Apple market in Manette.

The per-gallon price for unleaded in Kitsap County was $2.32 Monday, down from $3.49 just a month ago and from $4.37 when it hit its peak last summer, according to auto club AAA.

In many places in Kitsap, it's a dime cheaper than $2.32.

"But yeah, it still sucks, it's still horrible," said wine seller and distributor Pete Lettan of Silverdale. He drives 3,000 miles a month among grocery stores and restaurants, and the price at the pump is still too high for comfort.

Still, a 47 percent drop in gas since June has caused some relief.

Stay-at-home mom and Ford Expedition owner Fran Lawrence of Bremerton drives her two children to sports in different locations.

"I'm not always hearing about having the gas tank needing filling up," she said. "It's kind of going back to a normal thing."

Kitsap's gas price was higher than the national average, which was at $2.24.

Harrison Medical Center worker Julia Weick of Bremerton has a husband who commutes in his Honda to Fife every day.

"It makes a big difference in the pocketbook for a while," she said.

Many questioned said they expect the price of gas to rise now that the presidential election is done and OPEC is putting on the squeeze. No way, they said, are they going back to their gas-guzzling ways.

Business owners said the same.

Jan Galloway, owner of Barney's Quick Stop in Manette, said lower prices have not translated to customers pumping more.

"There are layoffs everywhere," she said.

Unemployment in Kitsap in September, the latest figure available, was at 5.3 percent. Some 6,580 people were unemployed here that month, according to the state Department of Employment Security.

On auto row at Thomas Lincoln Mercury, sales consultant Jon Rohlman said business was down about 40 percent from last year. Nationally, auto sales are down 32 percent, their lowest level in 17 years, according to the Associated Press.

One sector not doing bad at all is used commuter cars like his Nissan Sentras and Altimas, Rohlman said. There's even some interest in this economy in larger sedans like the Lincoln Town Car, he said.

Over the summer when gas was sky-high, auto sellers weren't accepting gas-guzzlers as trade-ins, he explained. Today, they're staying home parked in the garage, and used for just for short distances.

Rohlman said he expects the price of gas to bottom out and head back to around $2.75 a gallon.

But even though OPEC has cut production and promises to cut more, waning demand so far has erased any hike in the price of oil, according to AP.

On Monday, oil was at $62 a barrel.

Gas in Washington state averaged $2.37 a gallon on Monday. Alaska was highest at $3.32. Three states — Missouri, Oklahoma and Ohio — had average prices per barrel under $2.